Watch Over Me [Bargain Price] [Paperback]

Christa Parrish (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2009

Deputy Benjamin Patil is the one to find the infant girl--hours old, abandoned in a field. When the mother can't be located, Ben and his wife, Abbi, seem like the perfect couple to serve as foster parents. But the baby's arrival opens old wounds for Abbi and shines a harsh light on how much Ben has changed since a devastating tour in Iraq. Their marriage teeters on the brink and now they must choose to either reclaim what they once had or lose each other forever.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Parrish (Home Another Way) has a lot going on in this story: Benjamin Patil, an Indian-American deputy sheriff in a small South Dakota town who is troubled after a tour of duty in Afghanistan, finds an abandoned baby. He talks his wife, Abbi, a vegetarian war protester and potter, into foster parenting, although their marriage has been troubled since Ben returned from the Middle East, where his best friend was killed in action and he was injured. Then there's the subplot, involving Matthew, a deaf teenager on kidney dialysis living with his trailer-trash aunt and her four daughters because she offers more stability than his drunken mother, dad (a potential kidney donor) being out of the picture. Parrish makes a lot of the complications work, even with a few too many social issues (PTSD, bulimia, alcoholism, broken families, abandoned infants, political dissent, alternative lifestyles). Ben and Abbi are well-drawn and compelling characters, but the sprawling plotting makes the book superficial as it tries to do too much. Parrish is a fine writer and should keep it simple for greater impact. (Oct.)
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Review

"...Christa Parrish writes a compelling story that is filled with real-life problems and raw emotions." --5MinutesforBooks.com

Parrish's deft characterization pulls readers into a storyline filled with raw emotion. At first it's unclear how the third character fits into the plot, but when it's revealed, the story comes together seamlessly for an unforgettable conclusion. --Romantic Times Book Reviews, October 2009

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Bethany House; Original edition (October 1, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0764205544
• ASIN: B00381B8AY
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (44 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #483,264 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Watch Over Me - Actually 3-1/2 stars, March 5, 2010

By 

C. Kendall - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Watch Over Me (Paperback)

When Deputy Benjamin Patil finds a baby girl only a few hours old abandoned in a field, he and his wife Abbi are chosen to be foster parents for her. But, their home is filled with stress and disagreement and may not be the ideal home for this baby. The source of the tension is Benjamin's trauma while serving in Afghanistan. Their lives intersect with a young man, Matthew who suffers from several medical issues and comes from a troubled family. As Abbi and Benjamin continue to take care of the baby, more and more pain is revealed and their marriage struggles to survive.

I have to say I have mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand, Christa Parrish is a very gifted writer and storyteller. She is definitely an author I am interested in continuing to read. I found this book to be a bit too edgy for my liking. Now, I usually like edgy books, a lot, but this one just did not agree with me entirely. One reason for that is possibly because of the sexual presence in this story. Don't get me wrong, this book was not trashy or smutty at all, but I just felt it was a bit much for my liking. I also had trouble relating to Abbi and her more liberal tendencies, especially her anti war stance.

I really liked Matthew's part in this story. He was my favorite character and I felt he was a strong presence in this story. His persistent faith and determination were inspiring.

Overall, this book is well written, the story is interesting with very real characters. If you like edgy fiction, this is definitely the book for you.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Book with no focus, January 5, 2010

By 

Julie Hedlund (Lafayette, CO) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Watch Over Me (Paperback)

This book fell completely flat for me. The story strings together a whole series of implausible events bound by characters that are at best, skeletal and at worst, downright unlikeable.

So much went wrong here it's hard to know where to begin. Let's begin with implausible events. One of the main characters, Benjamin, serves in Afghanistan with his lifelong best friend, Stephen. Would the armed forces allow lifelong friends to serve together in the same unit? I doubt it. Ben returns scarred physically and shattered emotionally to his pacifist, vegan wife. Needless to say, there are problems. So it seems plausible that he would, in the line of his detective duty, find an abandoned newborn baby in the woods and bring it home to raise with the wife he hasn't really spoken to in months. Oh, and having a NEWBORN in the home would begin to make things better between the couple!! Sleep deprivation does work wonders for solving marital problems.

So much is left unexplained, and many threads of the story never lead anywhere. Abbi comes from an economically privileged but emotionally barren family. She's liberal and vegan but we don't know why she developed those views. Her obsession with her weight and the corresponding eating disorder might explain the vegan diet, but not her anti-war stance and her extreme environmentalism. Meanwhile, Ben comes from an immigrant family with parents whose marriage was arranged. The significance of that and how it shaped Ben's views about life, family or marriage is never explained. Nor do we truly understand why he wanted to serve in the military.

While the author leaves gaping holes in developing the characters, she smacks us upside the head with a brick with near constant references to Abbi's vegan-ness. Okay, we GET it, that she's unconventional and crunchy without constant reminders. Abbi has a nose ring, wears recycled sari skirts, uses baking soda for deodorant, cloth diapers for the baby, eats carob and cranberry bars, her friend drives a Toyota Prius, she drinks soy milk, and on and on and on and on. What would have been FAR more interesting was understanding WHY she did those things. There are vague references to her views being outside the norm in her church. Why? How did her views shape her experience of Christianity? We don't have any idea, but we DO know what she ate for breakfast.

Then, there are complete contradictions in the story. Abbi's friend Lauren, for example, comes to bail her out of a breakdown. Abbi asks why she's there, and Lauren responds (paraphrasing), "That's the church. We're called to help one another in a time of need. Where else would I be?" This after refusing to speak to Abbi for 13 months because Abbi's husband survived Afghanistan and hers didn't. Seems a pretty sanctimonious statement given their history. It's not that I don't think people can be contradictory, but we don't know how Lauren came to her change of heart because the author only provides a trite explanation during an "all-of-a-sudden" reconciliation scene.

I could go on, but I won't. You get the idea. I didn't like the book. If you read it, I hope you will. There are a whole set of other characters and story lines, including that of the baby, that are more interesting than Abbi and Ben. I won't go into it here so as to avoid spoilers. My interest in the outcomes for the other characters was what enabled me to finish the book.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars So, So, March 25, 2010

By 

E. K. Collins (Idaho) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Watch Over Me (Paperback)

Abbi and her husband, Benjamin, live in a small town. Ben has recently come home from war in Afghanistan where is best friend was killed. Their marriage is on the brink and Benjamin just can not get over the horror of losing his friend and the blame he places on himself for it.

However, when Deputy Benjamin Patil finds an abandoned infant in a field and then Abbi and him become the baby's foster parents will it help him get out of the pain he is living in? Or will it push him over the edge?

There are a couple of different characters in the book, whose stories are laid out~ however they do cross and mingle.

This story does not necessarily have a happy ending~ which is refreshing. I have been reading many books over the last 6 months or so and 99% of them have fictional happy endings.

However I was disappointed that the author did not dive deeper in to her characters. I got bits and pieces of information about Abbi and Ben, but did not know why Abbi was a vegan, had bulimia, and had an emotionless childhood with her parents. I needed to know more.

My favorite character was Matthew, I would have loved to find out his ending and where is life went past the end of this book.